“Superlatives confer extreme value on something, we need them to celebrate the worthiest things in our lives,” Plotnik said. “When we use the same superlatives — awesome, amazing, unbelievable and incredible — we’re not celebrating anything.”

Substituting words like “stellar” or “exalted” says much more about how we feel about something, Plotnik says.

Listener, Edison, says “I don’t like it when people say something is dumb. Dumb seams like such an inarticulate word.” While Julia Brown says the word “lovely” is “overused.”